Xanadu
by lederra
Summary: Things did not go well for Hawkeye following the battle of New York with Loki and his borrowed army. Slightly AU as this story was originally written before any of the other films were made. Rating it as a T at the moment but it will go up in later chapters as it gets darker.
1. Chapter 1

Xanadu

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters from the Avengers universe they are the property of their creator and only any O.C's that I create for this story are mine. As such I do not make any money from this or any other story that I write on this site.

A/N: I started this story a couple of years back and it has sat on my computer collecting proverbial cyber dust ever since. I had thought not to put up any new stories until I had finished some of my other stories but sometimes uploading new stories help me finish off my old ones and am hoping this will happen this time.

Hawkeye is one of my favourite characters in this fandom and despite the way this story will end up going, getting quite dark in places but I tend to do that with characters that I really like. So if Hawkeye whump is not your thing then turn back now!

Summary: After the battle of New York, things do not go well for Clint. He is arrested and imprisoned for his part in 'helping' Loki attack Midguard and then is thrown out of shield. His punishment following his arrest is to help to rebuild the city and he is inserted with a microchip so that shield can keep an eye on his activates as well as it keeping him a virtual prisoner in New York as he is not allowed to leave the city along with making sure he obeys the other restrictions on his day to day living.

Clint thinks that life cannot get worse but his life is about to get oh so worse. Might be a happy ending at the end of this or there might not be.

* * *

Clint coughed as he woke and leaned over the side of the cheap lumpy bed, reaching for a bottle of water that he kept just by the side of it, in a vain hope to clear the dry bitter taste that seemed to have taken permanent residence each morning in his mouth.

Taking a mouthful he grimaced as he swallowed the stale water, he found it disgusting but it was better than the taste he had woken up with in his mouth. Screwing the lid back on the bottle he then placed it back by the front leg of the bed, before leaning back trying to clear the his mind of the last residue of sleep, he had to be up soon and he hoped he could grab some food, before he left for yet another back breaking day toiling in the ruined streets of Manhattan.

Clint groaned softly to himself as he stretched his aching muscles, they were still sore from the previous day's activities and covered his eyes with his arm, as he contemplated how another night spent in this uncomfortable bed had not done much to ease the tension, and soreness in his muscles but there had been little he could do bout easing the soreness.

Realising with a groan that it was just not his muscles that ached but also his eyes, and his head was pounding with an evil throb. He would have loved to have taken a hot shower to ease some of the pain he was feeling but the dingy one roomed apartment that he now inhabited did not have the luxury of a hot shower, in fact it did not have the luxury of a shower at all.

Thinking back to the days following the attack on New York, Clint grimaced as he thought about his arrest and imprisonment and his subsequent apparent release from the prison to his existence now as one of the condemned and one of the most despised, thanks to the damn council, men in the whole of New York if not the world.

 _The battle for New York was over, the Chitauri horde had been smashed, driven back but only just and at a price, a lot of people were dead. The Avengers along with Clint had taken a little down time before reporting back to Fury and was now hours after the fighting had ended reporting back to the one eyed pirate and his crew._

 _As they had entered the base at New York Clint could see several agents waiting for them and he assumed that they would be in debriefing for quite a while, if the looks on the faces of the agents were anything to go by._

 _Recognising one of the agents at the front Jasper Sitwell, Clint possibly because of his tiredness, was taken unaware as the man stepped forward two other agents on either side of him blocking the archer in, segregating him from the Avengers. Sitwell held a pair of handcuffs in his hand and as he stopped in front of Barton he had snapped them on his wrists._

 _Natasha had stepped forward only to be stopped by Fury who had joined them._

 _"Stand down Agent Romanov," Natasha stared at Fury debating on whether to obey him or not._

 _Fury gave a minute shake of his head, undetected by many but not by her._

 _Romanov had stepped back, away from Clint but he had see the look of fury that had passed through her eyes, at what was happening._

 _Clint had been swiftly removed from the scene and placed in a cell, the agents who had placed him there had not been gentle with him. Not that he had expected them to be, they had lost friends and colleagues in the attack on the hellicarrier._

 _His trial, if it could have been called that, had been swift and he had been thrown out of Shield, out to the mercy of the public, his life that he had known destroyed._

Clint breathed in deeply and slowly sat up, he had a long day ahead of him.

* * *

 _A/N:_ I always do small first chapters as a taster to see if there is any interest in the story, Hope you enjoy it and hope you all had a peaceful and safe New Year.


	2. Chapter 2

A/N: As there is more interest in this story then I thought there might be, I have decided to do the new chapter earlier than I thought I would. Clint might seem a bit OOC in places during this story and I apologise for that and I will try to keep him in character as much as I can but there is a reason for the way he is behaving and as the story proceeds hopefully all will be revealed concerning his behaviour.

* * *

Clint groaned under his breath as he slipped on some rubble that he had been helping to clear. Unlike most of those helping to clear the rubble Clint was one of the few who was not wearing any safety clothing apart from a helmet, the powers that be determined that he had no rights to protective clothing of any kind, and if someone had not kindly pointed out to them that if he was not wearing a helmet and an accident occurred they no longer would have his free labour.

So they had grudgingly allowed him the hard hat and it was as well he had it, some citizens and some of those he laboured beside had a habit of throwing things, such rocks at him to show their disgust of his actions that had in their opinion caused much of the destruction on the city. The fact that he had been one of the people actually defending the city during the battle made little difference to most of them, as far as they were concerned they were unable to get their hands on the main one Loki, so Clint was the next best thing!

As he slipped again he felt his ankle give a little, the trainers he was wearing were not at all suitable for clearing rubble and so far he had been lucky that he had not ended up with any crushed toes or a crushed foot but as they were all he had, he had no choice.

The sound of the lunch siren ringing signalled the break period and he stopped sitting down on the nearest pile of rubble, he made no effort to join the others who were working in the same area as he was and there would have been no point joining them for even though they would have been eating whatever they had brought with them or sharing in the food provided, Clint knew there would have been no food for him.

He let his eyes drift over the rubble that still needed to be cleared and he tried to think what the building had been here before the attack, it took him a few minutes and remembered that the street where he was sitting had had a number of small business's here and a few of those business's had survived, one of them being the little cafe place that Stark had been insistent on visiting at the end of the battle to eat.

It had been such a long time since he had eaten anything half decent, the food that was given to him tended to be scraps that would have been heading for the bins, at the beginning of his sentence. It had been whatever had been left over from the food shared by all the workers but the others, had soon cottoned on that the left overs were being given to Clint at the end of the day, and so on most days they made sure there was not any left over either at all or what was left was spat on by some of them or contaminated in some other way.

Clint had lost a lot of weight in the last few months and though he knew he still had a good bit of muscle tone left, he was not as muscled as he had been before Loki.

The sound of a bird cawing off in the distance caught his attention and he looked to the heavens, spotting what looked to be a crow perched on top of a crumbling wall. He watched it for some time, his mind lost for the moment as he watched the bird take flight and disappear over the skyline. He envied that bird, it could go where he could not, out of the city and away from the rubble that had still to be cleared and people who might hate it.

Rocks tumbling down the rubble was the only thing that alerted him to the fact that he was no longer alone and he whipped around to see a shadow disappearing into part of a ruined building not far from where he was presently day dreaming. He did not know who the person was and part of him did not care, whoever it was most likely did not mean him well, he was friendless in a city that hated him, even his so called best friend Natasha had turned her back on him after he had been thrown out of Shield. Not that he blamed her, he knew she was doing what was best for her, for if she had been associated with him in any way, her own career would have been put in jeopardy but it had still hurt none the less, when she had not supported him in any way.

He heard the siren go signalling the end of the lunch break and he wearily stood and began clearing rubble again.

XxX

That had been close, Clint had almost spotted her as she had made her way over the rubble towards this small building that she had known had somehow miraculously survived the destruction, that had rained down on the street all around it during the battle.

She saw him looking towards where she had managed to jump the last few feet, normally her movements over rough ground were silent but some of the rubble had been looser than she thought it had been.

As she settled down to watch him, she observed that he had lost more weight, she noted that he did not seem to be eating whether through choice or otherwise she did not know. She had heard the lunch time siren go and had assumed that he would be moving towards where the other workers were presently eating but when he had not made an appearance, she had tried to make her way undetected towards the area that the microchip, that shield had placed inside him when they had terminated his contract and fed him to the proverbial wolves, had registered on her hand held device that he was working.

Also noting that he appeared to be limping, as she took out her camera and started to take snaps of him, the trainers he was wearing was not suitable but she knew as did all those in the know that the powers to be, had decided that he did not deserve any safety gear of any sort, they did not care if he got hurt or not. However, she did note the hard hat on his head, she was pleased that he at least had that, someone must have listened when she had sent her last report in on him.

As she continued to snap away, she noticed a small group of men approaching from the other side of the destroyed street, two separated from the group as if to keep watch while the other three continued towards Clint. They were up to no good she thought but she could not give her position away and warn Clint as they approached him, so she continued to snap away with her camera and observe as the three men finished crossing the derelict street and stopped in front of where he was working.

It was not long before she saw the three men attack Clint, two of them holding his arms as the other started to pummel mostly his torso and a few blows to his face.

* * *

A/N: So who is Clint's mystery watcher do you think, if you think you might have an idea leave a review (if you want) and let me know.


	3. Chapter 3

A/N: Thank you for the reviews and there have some interesting theories on who Clint's watcher is. Well this story seems to have caught a few peoples interests and as I seem to be on a role with it at the moment so I am now working on the new chapter and hopefully this chapter will be done in just a few hours or a few days, we shall have to wait and see. Or that is whoever is reading will have to wait and see.

In this chapter you also get to meet another of the main characters of this story. Unfortunately fan-fiction only allows so many to be put in the summary thing so there are more than a few regular characters that you will also meet along the way, as well as a few more Oc's.

Evil sod ain't I?

Hehehehehehe!

* * *

Clint groaned as he pushed himself up from the ground, his eyesight was blurry and he felt as though the world was spinning way too fast, for him get up straight away. He managed to push himself into a hunched sitting position, his ribs were screaming at him, gingerly he felt them, none of them were broken as far as he could tell but as for fractured he was not sure.

He could hear people working in the distance so he supposed that he had not been out for long, the supervisor would have come over and kicked him if he had been. Not that the thug cared about him, he was one of them that made his life as hard as he could but he couldn't afford for Clint to die on his watch, too many others wanted a piece of him before he finally had a fatal accident.

Hearing footsteps approaching Clint assumed it was the supervisor, maybe he had been out longer than he had thought.

"Are you alright?"

Clint glanced up to see not his supervisor approaching but rather a smartly dressed gentleman with a couple of guys following him. For a moment Clint thought it was the guys who had beaten him up coming back for round two and he flinched a little as the man knelt down in front of him. As he did so, Clint realised that it was not the thug who had tried to use his torso and face as a punchbag, as the man again spoke to him.

"I asked if you are alright pal?"

Clint nodded, wincing as pain shot through his head at the movement. He clamped his teeth, so as not to groan again and to stop himself from being sick in front of the man who it seemed had come to help him for some reason. He was weary of the stranger but the last few months had made him even more weary of everyone especially anyone claiming to interested in his welfare.

"Yeah," he croaked, "I'm fine."

"Well you don't look fine my friend, you look like you have gone a round or two with the hulk."

Clint glared at the man, he tried to get to his feet, he wanted to get away from this man. His world tilted again as he tried to stand, the man in front of him shot his hand out to steady him.

"Whoa there, you are not fine despite you thinking you are Mr Barton."

Clint glanced up sharply at the man, he didn't know him, he was certain of that but the man clearly knew him and for a confused moment he was unsure as to how, but then his mind cleared for clarity for an instant and laughed, a bitter laugh, of course the stranger knew him, everyone in this goddamn town knew of him.

The man helped him to sit back down as Clint seemed to wilt, his spirit giving up for a moment, he waited for the guy to start flailing on him, like everyone else in this town seemed to do whenever they got a chance but the expected blows did not fall.

Clint felt something wet touch his face and he flinched again, cringing internally at how jumpy he had become of late, he truly was as pathetic as he had been constantly told since his life had gone down the toilette.

XxX

The watcher had slipped away after Clint had been beaten unconscious, she had watched the thugs also slipping away when their task was done but not before one of them had kicked Clint in the face, even from where she was watching she had heard the snap of the boot against Clint's face and she had winced. That kick was going to hurt especially when her target regained consciousness and she also knew when she handed her photos to the man who had employed her to watch, would not be either pleased about the kick to Clint's face.

She knew that he had plans for the man that she had been watching and any bruises on his face was something he definitely had not wanted, if the target was too bruised then he would not be making money for her employer any time soon. Something that would definitely piss off her employer, money after all was possibly the only thing he truly loved and an asset that could make him no money was of no use to him at all.

As she slipped out of the building and started to make her way away from the scene, she saw three men in the distance making their way over to her fallen target, she could see that he was beginning to move. Consciousness was not swift in coming back she could see but the beating he had received had been vicious.

Slipping round the side of the building and into the alley behind it, she made her way over to her parked car, pulling the door open she slipped in and out her camera equipment over onto the passenger seat. Starting the car, she reversed it back into the street and then made her way across town to where she was to meet her employer.

XxX

Charlie Henderson leaned back in his seat and stretched, he had had a long day and it was far from over yet. Soon the asset he had had someone watching would be in his grasp, he had plans for the former disgraced Shield agent but first he had to deal with those he had hired to do certain jobs for him.

The sound of a knock at his office door informed him that one of his hired hands had arrived and called out for them to enter.

"Come in."

The door opened and his little watcher entered his office, her camera equipment in her hand. He waited as she approached his desk, he felt the excitement inside him building this was one part of his work that he found quite exhilarating, the anticipation of what he would see on the photos of his soon to be asset.

"There are the pictures you wanted Mr Henderson, I kept watch like to told me to, even when those thugs beat the crap out of him. I took snaps of everything, of the target, the thugs, the beating, I left before he regained consciousness though. Although he was starting to come to as I left but I made sure that he didn't see me nor the three men who approached when he was still on the ground."

Charlie nodded as he listened to her words, his watcher had slipped back a cover on one of the compartments of her camera as she was speaking, and removed the memory card which she then handed to him.

He slipped it into the computer that sat on the desk in front of him, he scrolled down through the images but stopped at the one showing the thug who kicked Clint in the face, while he was laying on the ground after the beating.

His watcher standing before his desk watched as he had scrolled down and saw the look on his face when he had stopped at she assumed to be the image of the thug kicking the target in the face. She saw her employers eyes squint and the look of pure rage briefly flash through them, she knew the one who had done the kicking was going to be in for a world of hurt.

Charlie still looking through the pictures gestured at her with his hand to get out and she did, she knew from the mans reputation that when he told someone to do something they did it quick. If they didn't, well depending on his mood they either would not be around long enough to regret it and generally they were the lucky ones, the unlucky ones lived long enough to regret their actions.

Slipping out of the door, she glanced back briefly not at all liking the look on the face of her employer.

* * *

A/N: I'm thinking that someone is going to be in trouble. What will he do to the one who kicked Clint in the face?


End file.
